Manchester City believe the link-up with their New York sister club can help turn their boy Blues to men.

City currently have two young players - Angelino and Shay Facey - on loan with New York City .

And former City Academy Director Brian Marwood – now managing director of Football Services for the City Football Group - says it is a valuable means of aiding the club’s commitment to producing homegrown talent.

Marwood, like his former protege and current EDS head coach Patrick Viera , believes English football’s under-21 system is failing to provide a suitable challenge for young players on the pathway to the first-team squad.

“There is a lot of debate here in England on this topic as in other countries you see clubs have ‘B teams’,” he said. “Barcelona have a B team which plays at a level something like the English Championship and in Portugal and Germany you can also field teams in men’s football at a very early age.

Shay Facey

“Our boys play under-21 football and it’s not providing the platform for bridging that gap between being an 18-year-old and being a first-team player for Manchester City.

“What we have to do is find a pathway and we believe that New York can help. If you look at the last eight teams in the Champions League this year then over 80 per cent of the players involved were playing men’s football at the age of 18. That’s an amazing statistic.

“We don’t have that environment in England, and it is very difficult because the rules do not allow us to have a B team in the lower divisions. We have to try and create opportunities for the players.”

Angelino has joined Shay Facey at New York

Marwood is confident that link - and City’s work with with their academy at the new City Football Academy - will pay dividends and provide players for the first-team squad.

“I think over the next five years we will see more homegrown players within the first-team squad,” he added in an interview with Sport360.

“I believe we have the right level now. We have a young player for example, Jason Denayer, who played at Celtic last year. He was the Young Player of the Year in Scotland and also made his debut for the Belgium national team.

“He is a very promising and highly-rated young defender and there is every chance he will be in our first-team squad this year. So I believe more and more players will come through our system.

“I think football has become a global game. We have players in our academy who are from Manchester, we also have players from Spain, Austria, Norway and from all parts of the world. The important thing is talent, what is their ability like and could they play for Manchester City’s first team?”